Jack Cohen's Blog about Israel and other daily amusements

Beelzebub and Bluetooth

Sorry about the typo in my previous message, it should have been “diverticulitis,” which is the inflamed version of diverticulosis. Another story from my hospital stay, my bed was next to a window and in the morning when I opened the curtain a horde of flies were attracted to the light. I called myself Beelzebub, literally “Lord of the flies,” made famous in the William Golding novel of the same name. The word comes originally form Hebrew, Ba’al meaning Lord (and husband in modern Hebrew) and zvuv meaning fly (“v” and “b” are interchangeable). It was used in the Bible to describe a Philistine God. Anyway, I smote those flies with Biblical ferocity and I was victorious, hence “Lord of the flies.”

Being hospitalized in Israel has its own word, ishpuz, which is actually an Aramaic word. It has the same source as in English, meaning hospitality. Some of you may be aware of the Israeli movie “Ishpuzin”, meaning having guests in your Succa during Succoth (Tabernacles). Note that Aramiac words have the plural ending “in” while Hebrew words have the ending “im.” During the time of the Romans the lingua franca in the Holy Land was Aramaic. During that period many Aramaic words entered Hebrew and many prayers were translated into Aramaic so that the ordinary people could understand them. In some cases in the prayer book there is the same prayer in both languages, some people read only one version, but some read both.

On a different topic, I have a Bluetooth detector in my car for my mobile phone, it’s great. When I upgraded to a new phone recently, I forgot to check that it could be used with a hands-free adaptor. It could not, I discovered, too late. They first suggested getting a separate phone for the car, but I didn’t think that was worth it. Then they suggested getting a Bluetooth detector. It is a remote device that when turned on allows the phone to be heard and talked to without any connection thru wireless transmission and detection. Couldn’t be easier. Life made simple, thru complex devices.